Standing beneath the steeple, playing in the cornfields, learning to be a pastor while trying to faithfully preach the Good News, and the church who loves me anyway.

There is a balm in Gilead…

Yesterday was a rather icky day. DH and I spent the day fighting, and both said some things that weren’t very nice or helpful. And the day left me feeling, on the whole, rather wounded.

I finally had enough of the house, and grabbed my knitting things to set off to a gathering of other knitters. I left a few minutes early, thinking that the hospital was on the way, and I could make good use of a trip and go visit one of my folks. I was thinking it would be a quick “Hey there–Just wanted you to know we’re praying for you” visit (as I’ve driven over a 100 miles back and forth to the hospital since she was admitted not quite two weeks ago). But she started talking, and I started talking, and we sat and listened. And then I realized that that room was exactly where I needed to be…because it was a place of healing. Oddly enough, it wasn’t bodily healing that I’m talking about– it seemed to be much more soul healing. I can’t explain it, but as we were talking about everything under the sun, from her dogs to the special bra women heart patients have to wear all the time (to keep ’em from flopping over and pulling the incision a part, I learned), I realized that my soul was being ministered to. That’s always a weird feeling for a minister to be ministered to. But I was exactly where I was supposed to be, and I stayed there for over an hour talking about everything and nothing.

The song that is lurking around in my brain says, “There is a balm in Gilead, to heal the sinsick soul. There is a balm in Gilead, to make the wounded whole.”

I stomped out of the house thinking a group of knitters might be the balm I was looking for, but I never made it that far. I don’t think I needed to, after all.